


Of Gardens and Burning Fires

by orphan_account



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Gen, Manipulation, Religious Imagery & Symbolism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-31
Updated: 2018-08-31
Packaged: 2019-07-05 02:10:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15854073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: A snake finds its way to Zion





	Of Gardens and Burning Fires

  
When she looks at him, with all the sins that haunted the garden of Eden shining behind green irises, he burns all over again.

Fire licks at his scarred skin, as a hand grazes over his arm, sliding its way upwards. He wants to stop her, to drown her soothing voice, as he had done to the demons that plagued his mind.

But no; the demons never left, and neither did she.

So she keeps whispering words of peace, and his ears strain to hear the gospel that falls from her lips like poison from a snake's fang.

The White Legs had no hope of victory, not against the monster that he invited in his garden and that would gladly dine on his flock, had he allowed her.

So he watches her as havoc spreads around her like a pestilence, as Salt-Upon-Wounds falls to his knees in defeat. The White Legs are defeated, and the Dead Horses are not.

Salt-Upon-Wounds is all that's left of the taint that spread through Zion, and all that's left of him are the blasphemous pleas for mercy that reached the ears of a would-be monster and one that had been monstrous but was no more. Or was he?

_Blood for blood, and a tribe for another_ , whispered demons that had died in the fire alongside with Joshua Graham. She must have heard them too, for she pressed a gun against his hand.

"There is peace in death," she murmurs.

With trembling fingers, he takes the gun and points it to the broken man in front of him.

When he presses the trigger, two die; the man baptized in fire and pitch, and the coward who accepted the apple without caring for the consequences.

A gunshot rings across Zion. A body hits the ground, his arms spread open like a Christ on the cross, as his brothers and sisters welcome him in death.

A monster dies and is reborn anew, this time in silence rather than ash.

In the end, the snake has feasted upon both shepherd and herd, and all that was left was to slither back to Hell and watch as Heaven burned.

**Author's Note:**

> wtf is this


End file.
